


The Hope That Bonds Us

by tiredgaykeith



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, Friendship, Gen, Graphic Description, Jaeger Pilots, Minor Character Death, Team Bonding, Voltron is a Jaeger
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-22
Updated: 2018-12-22
Packaged: 2019-09-24 17:40:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17105153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiredgaykeith/pseuds/tiredgaykeith
Summary: (Timelines AU Zine Piece)Pidge lost everything when the kaiju attacked. Her home, Her parents, and her brother. She blocks the memories of her brother's piloting days from her mind, but when Takashi Shirogane, her brother's jaeger partner, comes to her with an offer of a lifetime, she's forced to confront what has been keeping her from moving on from the past.





	The Hope That Bonds Us

**Author's Note:**

> So this was written nearly a year ago, so Adam don't exist, sorry not sorry lol.

“You’re fucking insane,” Pidge scoffed and turned back to her lab table, “I’ve never piloted a jaeger once in my life, Shiro. Matt was a pilot, I’m not. And you are fucking insane if you think I’m going to be able to help pilot the most powerful jaeger in all of history.”

Out of the corner of her lab goggles, Pidge saw Shiro trying to say something again, so she quickly turned her sawing tool back on and broke into the kaiju rib.  Working for the Garrison as a lab technician was a hellish job, yes. Long hours, shit bosses, and everyone held an air around them like they were holding their breath, waiting for the next alarm to go off and send them all rushing to their stations. Not many had the privilege to work on kaiju samples, though. To test for weaknesses and strengths, to one day find a way to kill them with ease. For that alone, Pidge felt the job was worth it. That, and she was safer inside the steal, thick walls of the underground barracks than anywhere above on land.

Her mind went to her brother’s face, smiling behind his thick, round glasses, laughing and telling her to lighten up.

This job didn’t keep everyone safe, though.

Pidge stopped the saw as it finally broke through the bone, setting the tool down and pulling away her goggles and mask. Shiro, much to her ever growing annoyance, started again.

“You are his sister, Katie-,”

“Pidge,” she spat out, “I go by Pidge now.”

Shiro sighed, but continued.

“Pidge, you are Matt’s sister,” Shiro persisted, coming up to her and placing his real hand, not the one he got after his and her brother’s last fight, on her shoulder, “I saw you every time we drifted. You were given the same training as him but never found a compatible partner. Then they transferred you to work in the labs. This jaeger, this battle, Pidge you are the only one who can take this position.”

For a moment they were both silent again, Pidge staring into space, Shiro staring at her. The other scientists around them took curious glances if brave enough, but looked away with a quick glare from Pidge. Shiro took a long breath.

“Listen, if you won’t, that’s on you,” Shiro said, already backing away towards the lab door, “But if you don’t, Voltron won’t battle, and if Voltron doesn’t battle, then all humanity has are those walls out there by the sea. And we both know how that’s going to end.”

With that, Shiro was finally gone, and Pidge took a sigh of relief, though the tension in her shoulders and mind remained.

_And we both know how that’s going to end._

Pidge picked the saw up again, and started cutting away, trying to drown out Shiro’s voice in the back of her head, the truth she was afraid to face wrapping itself around the most fragile parts of her mind.

* * *

In the end, Pidge lost the battle with her conscious and she attended the candidate trials..

_I shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t be here,_ the words repeated themselves in her head as she entered through the doors into the trial arena, her eyes meeting many others, some familiar and others new. The heat in the room overwhelmed her, smelling of stale sweat and iron. She walked forward.

Pidge wasn’t an easy person to break. She’d seen many cities (hell, her own city) fall at the impenetrable power of the kaiju that wrecked their world. She lost her parents young, both sacrificing themselves during the early battles against the kaiju so Matt and Pidge could live and eventually find place in the Garrison. Matt was thirteen when he became a cadet, and Katie ten when she started working assistant in the grungy laboratory that would become her home.

Matt was only sixteen when he became an official pilot with Shiro, fighting in Kerberos.

Pidge was only fourteen when she was delivered the news that the Kerberos had been destroyed in combat against two kaiju.

It made her stronger overtime. Like broken bones, with every crack inflicted on her mind and body, she healed with new strength and power. It almost embarrassed her that Shiro had been able to wear her down so easily to get her here.

The candidates talked in small circles, some sizing her up with arrogance, some with spite. She could fight all of them, take on even the giant ones, thanks to being trained as a soldier twice as long as any of the rest of them had. That wasn’t what the candidate’s trials were about though.

At the front of the room three figures stood out against the candidates white sparing clothing, each dressed in identical, black clothing. The ones who’ve been chosen.

Lance Serrano and Keith Kogane stood off to the side, whispering to one another while eyeing the people in front of them. Both were renown pilots with experience and a reputation that went well past the ten foot, metal walls of the Garrison’s academy. They shared a strong bond, the perfect definition of opposites attract when it came to piloting pairs. It wasn’t uncommon to see action figures of the two in the safe, landlocked cities like Moscow.

And of course, taking the most attention, was Shiro. Standing at attention in front of the masses of students, his eyes scanned the room and eventually landed on Pidge. She watched as his eyes widened slightly, and fought off a smile, before re-focusing on the entire crowd.

“Attention!” Shiro’s voice bellowed through the room.

Immediately, all hushed murmurs went quiet, and the room was quiet enough you could hear a pipe leaking somewhere in the walls.

Pidge rolled her eyes. There wasn’t a reason for that, he had already had the enter rooms attention just by being there.

“We will commence the trials in five minutes,” Shiro’s gravelly voice echoed in the heated, small sparing room, “You will be broken into thirds. One third spares with Pilot Kogane, another with Pilot Serrano, and the last third with me. Any matches will then be spared against the next pilot, and so on, until we find our two final matches. Remember. This is not a place to show off, or stand out. You are trying to match your partner, not beat them. To pilot a jaeger, especially Voltron, you must be willing to learn, to teach, to take, to give with a complete stranger. This is not a position to take lightly, nor is it a position for just anyone.”

A large guy with a long orange headband to the right of Pidge seemed to shrink into himself, Pidge probably wouldn’t have noticed if he wasn’t so much bigger than the rest of the candidates. He didn’t seem up for it. Pidge’s eyes flickered back to Shiro, her muscles tensing as his eyes caught hers again, grey eyes boring into hers.

“You’ve been warned.”

The trials began quickly after, and Pidge was amused at how quickly each candidate fell to the pilots reflexes and trained skill. Her first match would be against Kogane, which interested her greatly. Kogane, while he appeared to be a hothead most of the time, Pidge found in combat he was intelligent and clever in all of his moves. Never letting a single movement go to waste, some would call the way he fought dirty. Pidge felt Kogane would scoff at that.

No one seemed to match him until one quick footed candidate ahead of Pidge, who left shaking hands with Kogane and a smug look on his face.

Pidge took a deep breath, her heart beating hard, and entered the ring. The padded flooring was a deep red like the walls around them. Pidge could hear a snicker from the back of the line, and when she looked up at Kogane, she was surprised to see he barely looked like he had sweated a drop. He looked enormously unimpressed.

Pidge widened her stance and calmed her mind, and met Keith’s eyes.

Calm. Connect. Balance.

Keith came in swinging his staff to her left side, and Pidge easily swiped away the throw. Keith tried again, and again. Going for her feet, arms, blind spots. But Pidge kept him in a dance around her, carefully blocking and maneuvering against each hit and thrust. The battle continued for ten minutes, a game of cat and mouse, until it finally ended in a draw, Keith hovering above her with sweat beading down his face and his lips curled into a snarl, both of their staffs pointed neatly at the other’s jugular.

As they pulled apart Keith’s face changed from the thrill of the fight to a calm and collected front. He reached out a hand to shake.

“Kogane,” he panted, “Keith Kogane.”

“Pidge,” Pidge didn’t reach for his hand, just turned away to the back of the room to rest before the next match.

If Shiro was watching her, she didn’t let on that she knew.

“Who does she think she is?” A whisper from the far side of the room hit her ears, “Being that rude to Keith Kogane?”

After the matches only five candidates of the previous thirty remained. Although she wasn’t sure why, she felt a warmth in her chest seeing that the gentle giant with the orange headband was still there, and from how closely Lance Serrano hugged him and joked with him, Pidge thought he was too.

Next match was Lance. Pidge wasn’t as stupid as some of the others here who fell right into the trap of going in for a strike first, she danced around the floor with him, both of them ready at any moment to strike, just waiting for the opening. Pidge had seen how Lance fought: unlike his partner Kogane, he was surprisingly patient in battle, waiting until the perfect opening came to tear his enemy down in one, firm sweep.

When Pidge seemed to be unrelenting, giving him no opportunity to strike second, his face grew contemptuous, sweat beading down his forehead. A shift of white hair caught Pidge’s peripheral vision, and just as her eyes met Shiro’s, Lance went in for the strike.

Pidge was much, much faster though.

In a quick lunge forward and hard leg swoop, Lance tripped behind her before catching himself on his feet. Quick paced lunging and hitting went on for awhile before Pidge landed a solid hit to Lance’s ribs while Lance got her in the back, knocking them both onto their knees.

Panting, Pidge looked up through sweaty bangs, shocked to see Lance grinning wildly at her. Someone yelled, “Match!” And it was over.

Lance got up and stretched before leaning down and lending her a hand. “You’re one hell of a fighter, man. What’s your name?”

“Pidge,” She spoke, and Lance’s eyes widened.

“Wait,” his face fell in confusion, “You... are a girl?”

Pidge didn’t bother giving him an answer, and simply moved away from the mat. When she looked back to the front of the room, now cleared out since the previous contenders had left, she noticed Keith and Shiro whispering between each other, their eyes on her. While she heard Lance shove another candidate into the floor padding, she knew what lied ahead.

Shiro was practically unbeatable in hand to hand combat, Pidge was sure most people knew and accepted that already. If she remembered, Matt had actually lost to Shiro i his first two candidate matches, and only later was able to fight against him again and tie in a quick witted draw.

Shiro was everything a fighter should be. Patient but quick. Thoughtful but clever. He had been watching Pidge fight against Keith and Lance, and he knew the tricks Matt pulled.

And from the dark look in his eyes, Pidge knew he wouldn’t go easy on her either.

Good. She still knew she could take him down.

When the fight began, unlike her previous battles, Pidge was smart enough to know to not let Shiro get the first jab in. She aimed for his legs and tried to throw him off balance, but as she figured Shiro already knew she would do that. They went at each other throwing jab after jab, not letting a single movement go to waste. Pidge spun on the back of heels and whipped Shiro against his jaw with her leg, but Shiro got her right back with a rough hit to the stomach from the staff.

Finally after what felt like an eternity, the match was called, and Pidge had proven herself. As she looked around the room, she realized only five people were left remaining. Only her and the big guy were the ones left in the candidate clothing.

“I told you,” Shiro said with a proud smile, “You were meant to be here, Pidge.”

He leant out his hand, but Pidge once again denied it, turning away.

She felt sick in her stomach, and she knew her life was about to change dramatically.

* * *

Smoke billowed from the engineers wielding the last pieces of the Voltron armor together, the sounds reverberating around the warehouse where the army kept the jaegers. Pidge sat alone on an abandoned dock station across from the jaeger, taking another thick bite from the standard ham and cheese sandwich they gave out for dinners, though each bite was as bland as the last as her thoughts spiraled her into a hole.

In less than a week’s time, she was expected to pilot in the left arm of the monstrous robot, never having piloted a jaeger in her life. The most extreme and powerful jaeger of its time, and one of the five pilots was to be a nobody scientist who happened to be related to a celebrated and fallen pilot. She knew if her brother hadn’t perished in his final mission with Shiro, than she would never have been here. She’d be back in the safety of her airlocked lab, testing kaiju skin samples for weakness. But instead, in a few days, she’d be face to face with a kaiju, one probably just like the one that killed her brother, and the rest of her family.

“There you are! We’ve seriously been looking for you everywhere, man!”

Pidge looked behind her, surprised to see Lance and Hunk in their standard cadet uniforms both coming up the stairs to the abandoned dock she had ran off to. Lance looked irritated but unaffected by the climb up, while Hunk struggled up the remaining few steps, though shooting her a friendly smile.

“How did you find me?” Pidge asked, a little more than mildly annoyed her favorite hideaway had been compromised.

“Well,” Lance walked over and sat down on the rusty, metal dock with her, “You weren’t at dinner, and when we asked Shiro he said you’re usually in the lab for meals, so we checked there. No luck. So we thought, hm where else could she run off to?”

“And you thought of this, specific abandoned dock zone?” Pidge hoped her distaste to their searching was obvious in her voice.

“No,” Hunk answered this time, finally joining the two, “But this is where, well, the Kerberos docked.”

Pidge felt that uncomfortable heat under her skin return again that she had felt at the candidate trials before the first fight began, the feeling of her body telling her to run and leave. The only thing Pidge hated more than being out of place in her environment was being out of place in the company of others.

A silence enveloped them while Pidge ate, before Lance got the nerve to speak up again.

“Your brother was Matt, right?” Lance asked, “We, uh, we hung out a lot back in the day, before the trials. Me, Hunk, and him got into a lot of trouble with the commanding officers. You remember that, Hunk?”

Hunk let out an exasperated groan.

“God, how can I not?” Hunk’s smile betrayed his feigned annoyance, “Mind you it was more you and Matt getting into trouble and me trying to cover for you guys.”

“Okay, okay,” Lance leaned back and let his legs dangle back and forth off the edge of the dock, “You got me there. There was that one time when Matt had made that little robot, oh god what was its name?”

“Rover?” Pidge’s interest beat out her desire to keep quiet, stalling both of the guys for a moment, before Lance gave her a toothy grin.

“Yes! Rover!” Lance said, “Oh my god, so your brother, he thought he could teach Rover to sneak some of Lieutenant Iverson’s booze past him while he napped. Iverson is always napping like right after dinner by his station and he always has some extra booze on hand. You following?”

Pidge nodded, trying to hide her smile by eating away at the sandwich as the two guys went back and forth about their escapades with Matt.

When Pidge had finished her food, she realized it hadn’t tasted so bland after all.

* * *

Unlike a typical drift, where the engineers hook you and your co-pilot up to the jaeger for your first spin, Shiro insisted they practice drifting with each other separately before trying to do a single drift together. Hunk also muttered something about also lowering the risk of all their brains splattering, but it was quickly ignored.

Drifting wasn’t something Pidge was used to, unlike everyone else there. Even Hunk had a chance to drift with Lance before this back in the academy, they had explained to her.

“Keep your breath as calm as possible,” Lance explained surprisingly serious, while they were hooked up together to the machine the engineers used for practice runs, “And when you feel that tingle in the back of your head, just let it take you. And it should happen.”

“Okay,” Pidge took a deep breath, feeling nerves under her skin.

“Hey?” Lance reached out and grabbed her hand, smiling softly, “Trust me, with everything. Okay? I will, too.”

_I do. I trust you, somehow._

“Ready?” Hunk was at the machine, looking between the two, Keith and Shiro were already mid-drift on the other side of the room.

Lance and Pidge looked into one another’s eyes, and nodded together.

“Ready.”

Pidge closed her eyes and heard Hunk flip a switch, calming her breath until it was barely present. A tingle hit the base of her neck, and just as Lance said, she let it swallow her.

Bursts of bright, cyan blue colored the vision beneath her eyes, and it felt as if she had been strapped into one of those old time roller coasters and her mind was jetted into the subconsciousness of her teammate.

_Mama is holding me in her arms and rocking me with a smile on her tired face._

_The sea is crystalline green and blue, melting with the setting sun that touches the waves below._

_Terrified screams ringing in my ears, as I’m swooped into my older brother’s arms and shoved into a shelter with the rest of the young children in our town. We huddle together as our families shut the heavy metal doors above us. Screams rip through the ground and we hear our families die. Red blood drips through the doors._

_The labor camp where I was sent to in Texas is underfunded. No one cares about the island kids who survived the destruction of the Caribbean. I run away._

_I find a chubby, bright-minded guy my age who can cook in the streets of Phoenix. His name is Hunk. He’s my only friend now._

Memory, after memory hits her as she lives through the worst and best moments in Lance’s life.

Finally the ride stops and she is brought back into the room, gasping for breath as her heart pounds in her chest. Lance is across from her, calmer but still shaken, tears are built in the corner of his eyes. They look at each other for a moment, each one of them knowing exactly what the other is thinking.

“Yeah, we’ve known each other quite some time,” Lance manages, his voice a bit rough, gesturing to Hunk who sat solemnly to the side, “And uh, really, Pidge. Matt, he-”

“It’s okay,” Pidge said, proud in how level she kept her voice, “Really, I like to think he’s somewhere a lot happier now.”

Lance smiled though it was ridden with guilt and regret. Pidge heard a deep breath being taken from the other side of the room, and turned to see Keith and Shiro had finally come back from their drift.

Lance scoffed and whispered, “Don’t know why they feel the need to drift, not like they haven’t lived together and experienced everything together for the past ten years. You don’t see me and Hunk drifting.”

Pidge drifted twice more, with Hunk and Keith. She saw Hunk fighting for his life off of Hawaii, Keith watching his parents being eaten alive. Each memory cut into her deep, a fresh new scar that she would share with her new partners. Each time when she came out of the simulation, she felt them get just a bit closer, too.

Finally, the drift she was dreading came around. Shiro sat across from her and they both took a deep breath, nodding to each other as they were hooked up to the simulation.

“I’m sorry,” Shiro said suddenly, his eyes casted to the floor.

“Don’t be, it was only a matter of time,” Pidge sighed, her hands shaking on her knees.

“Ready?” Huk said quietly, and they both nodded.

Pidge closed her eyes once again, and was off.

 

_I’m seven and Grandpa takes me out to the river in the forest and teaches me how to fish. I manage to get a big bass, and he smiles at me wide and toothy. I ask him if he thinks momma and pappa would be proud, and his smile falls._

 

_I’m twelve and I go into the city to get medicine for grandpa. Tears are welling up in my eyes knowing that he only has a few more weeks left. When I get to the center of town there are Garrison recruiters there, promising food, shelter, medical care._

_“Does medical care extend to your family?” I ask hesitantly, but the man smiles at me and nods._

_I join immediately._

 

_I’m fourteen and I meet a runt in the pack of fellow cadets, getting into fights with peers and questioning authority of the generals. He sits in a corner of the lunch room alone, so I walk over and sit across from him._

_I don’t know why, I think I just wanted to be there for someone. And someone to be there for me. A friend._

 

_I’m sixteen when I meet him for the first time, in the heated, sweaty candidate trials. His hair is so fluffy, I think. I shouldn’t have, he almost knocks me off my feet. He nearly is defeated twice, but comes back, as clever and filled with new tricks as usual. Someone calls the match, and it’s over, both of us tangled in mid battle. He looks at me with a bright smile, and I think my heart stops. I blame it on the heat of the room._

_“Matt Holt, nice to meet you.”_

 

_I’m eighteen and Matt and me are ruling the world. Keith is off battling with Lance somewhere, we are happy. In between battles and training, me and Matt sneak off to the top floor of the Garrison and watch the city lights from beyond the water. His eyes would shine as bright as the water._

_He would call me Takashi._

_If anything else happened, only us and the darkness surrounding us would know._

 

_I’m twenty, and I can barely breath as the two kaiju smash the Kerboros into the water, the right arm is ripped from the socket, and my arm goes numb._

_Matt is shouting that he can fix this, he just needs to get to the power controls on the other side of the room._

_He removes himself from his connections, despite me yelling at him not too._

_I watch as a tentacle slams through the heavy metal, water begins to pour in, and it wraps itself around Matt’s torso. I see his eyes one last time before the kaiju pulls him from jaeger, and he’s lost forever._

 

“No!” Pidge gasped, and removed herself somehow from the simulation.

“Wait, Pidge calm down!” Keith urged her, but Pidge shrugged him away, standing up shaking and tears running down her face.

Shiro is the same, staring at her wide eyed and hopeless.

“Pidge,” he manages, his voice is shaking.

“I got to go,” Pidge ran from the room, letting her legs take her away, as far as she could go.

She finally stopped at her room, collapsing onto her bed, sobbing as the memory played in her head on repeat.

Long, quiet minutes passed, before a gentle knocking was heard at her door.

“Please,” Pidge whimpered, “Go away, please.”

“It’s just me, Pidge.”

Pidge was surprised to hear Keith outside the door, she was sure Lance or Shiro would be the one to come running. After a few minutes, and still being able to feel Keith’s presence outside her door, she picked herself up off the pillows, and wiped her face clean with a towel.

She quietly walked to her door, and opened it slowly. Keith stood against the frame of the entry, though he didn't look pitying like she thought he would. He smiled softly at her in a way she didn’t know was possible for the other.

“Hey,” he said in a low whisper, “Can I please come in?”

Pidge nodded, allowing him to enter into the room. He walked in and his eyes widened as he took in the decorations she had set up around the room over the years.

“Wow, interesting,” he said while taking in the random pieces of tech that lied scatter around the room.

“Why are you here?” Pidge asked, figuring it was best to just cut to the chase.

“Shiro was worried, but I figured him going would be a shit idea. And god knows Lance can’t take this kind of stuff seriously enough.”

Well, good thing Keith was the same way.

“I’m being stupid,” Pidge sighed and collapsed back on her bed, “I got overwhelmed, and I just ditched. I’m not meant to be here.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Keith asked with an agitated tone, “You are the only person who could possibly take this position on and you have to know that too. I mean, come on. No one blames you for what happened back there.”

“I blamed him, and Shiro saw that,” Pidge said, her eyes trained to the ceiling, “He felt that, Keith. When there was nothing he could’ve done the entire time.”

“He doesn’t blame you for that, hell,” Keith scoffed, still walking aimlessly around the room and taking in the sights, “If things were switched? I would’ve reacted the same way.”

“Still doesn’t mean I deserve to be here,” Pidge said, closing her eyes and welcoming the darkness, “I’m weak.”

“We all are,” Keith said, sitting down beside Pidge, his voice sounding distant, “We all are struggling. That’s what makes us human and not those disgusting creatures. There is no shame in admitting your weakness. Only from letting it beat you.”

Pidge laughed a little at that. “So deep, man. What are you, some new age philosopher?”

Keith scoffed again, much to Pidge’s amusement. “Just get back in there, okay? We need you. Without you, we have no Voltron. You can do this, I know that.”

With that Keith got up off the mattress and headed back to the door. Right before he left, he turned back and looked at Pidge.

“You know,” he said with a smile, “You and Shiro are the toughest people I know. Don’t give up on us, Pidge.”

With that, Keith was gone, but the last message he left Pidge with stayed with her. After a moment, Pidge picked up a photograph that was framed on her bedside table, a photo of her family all those years ago. Her mother smiled and held onto her father, while Pidge and Matt hugged each other in almost a painfully forced way.

_Don’t give up on us._

Pidge set the photograph carefully back down, and left her room, heading back to the training room. She walked tall with a newly lit fire burning in her heart.

* * *

 

Fighting in Voltron was an experience like no other, and Pidge was sure even in death she would never forget it.

The waves and multiple heart beats pulsed in her ear as one being, one entity. She swung their arm to block a worm-like kaiju for going for the head, she felt Keith smash through it with Voltron’s sword.

“One more to go team,” Shiro’s words were in her ears though she wore no head set, “Let’s finish this.”

While the first drift was a rush and moving together with their minds melded into one was a challenge, within moments Pidge was surprised to find it extraordinarily easy.

_Only you can be the one who takes this place, Pidge._

And with a final smash into the kaiju stomach, bursts of illuminated goo popping from it while Hunk groaned that he was gonna be sick, Pidge felt her heart soaring. And somewhere deep inside her, past Lance’s whooping and Keith’s annoyed groaning, she felt her family, and she knew they were proud.

After the battle, and they all exited the jaeger, Pidge stumbled up to Shiro, who was sweaty and pale. They smiled at each other, and after a pause, Pidge wrapped her arms around the bulky white armor of their suits, and Shiro held her back.

“Aw!” Lance exclaimed, shoving himself into the mix of them, “Family hug!”

Hunk grabbed Keith and barreled in too, much to Keith’s distaste and Lance’s amusement. Pidge kept hugging Shiro, and she didn’t let go.

_Family._

* * *

 

“Hey, Hunk!” Lance groaned obnoxiously, sitting on the edge of the building with a hot dog sticking out of his mouth, “Don’t eat all the BBQ chips!”

“Um, excuse me?” Hunk narrowed his eyes at Lance and pouted, “Are you seriously complaining when I just made all of you guys food?”

“And you literally just ate five hot dogs!” Keith exclaimed, still munching on his third, “Are you actually complaining you don’t have enough food to shovel into your mouth like a dog?”

“Watch it, Keith! Or I’m gonna be shovelling something else up your-”

“Lance,” Shiro glared from where he laid stretched out on the top of the building, “You too, Keith. Enough.”

Both guys grumbled angrily under their breath, but Pidge just ignored them, letting the city lights wash over her as she watched the water hit the edge of the shore, again and again.

“We took on three kaiju today,” She commented, playing with a pebble between her shoe and the concrete, “That must be some sort of record.”

“Oh, yeah!” Lance agreed, shuffling down as he sat next to her, “Definitely a record. Voltron is gonna be worldwide, baby. Television shows, the news, movies, comic books-”

“You are way into the whole fame thing, man,” Keith sighed, pulling his hair from his ponytail to redo it.

“Nah, I mean, think about it,” Lance said excitedly, swinging an arm around Pidge and gesturing wildly to the city in front of them, “Voltron is gonna bring on a whole new era, guys! People have lost so much hope over the years. But Voltron _is_ hope. We could actually change the tide in this entire war. It’s like we’re, like-”

“Defenders,” Pidge said quietly, not even realizing she had until it slipped out.

“Oh, I actually really like that,” Hunk smiled as he joined them after putting away the rest of the food.

“Yes!” Lance exclaimed, “Defenders of the World - no, the Universe.”

Keith scoffed and Shiro chuckled.

“I think you’re getting ahead of yourself there, buddy,” Shiro laughed, but there was warmth in his voice that hadn’t been there before their victory today, “I gotta admit, though. Defenders of the Universe. Has a good ring to it.”

“This is just the beginning,” Lance said, his eyes sparkled against the city lights.

Pidge leaned back on her hands, and smiled at the stars above. There was a lot to be done. The city wasn’t fully convinced that Voltron was worth the money yet. And they still had a lot of training to do. But with her team, no. Her family around her, Pidge felt something in her chest she thought had disappeared along with Matt so long ago.

Hope.

And just like their resistance and her new family, it was just beginning to grow.

**Author's Note:**

> omg this was so self indulgent lol. Thanks for reading! Comments and kudos are very much appreciated! Come over and talk to me on twitter @ spookypidge !


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